


Now I Understand

by Jeevey



Category: Oasis (Band), U2 (Band)
Genre: Hero Worship, M/M, Sad Noel, annoying liam
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-03
Updated: 2019-12-03
Packaged: 2021-02-25 20:40:48
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21661579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jeevey/pseuds/Jeevey
Summary: "Did you see that? Did you SEE it?" Liam's face was incandescent with excitement.
Relationships: Bono/The Edge (U2), Liam Gallagher/Noel Gallagher
Kudos: 18





	Now I Understand

“Did you see that, man? Did you SEE it?” Liam was incandescent with excitement. “I’ve never seen anything like it in me life!” They were on their way to an after party, and the flickering lights of San Francisco were dim against his elation.

Noel had seen it, and couldn’t unsee. 

“It was just---fuckin’ huge. I mean the lights---and the bass, it was just so fuckin’ FAT.” Liam grasped his crotch to show what kind of fat it was. “I mean--fuck me.” 

Fuck me, well and truly. Noel had thought they knocked their set flat, thought that they were the best in the world. Then a pugnacious figure in a boxer’s robe came out swinging, and the two relentless hours that followed made him question--everything. He had thought until now that they were masters, but now he saw they were children at the feet of giants.

“The tone on those drums, it’s like a boot in your hole. And the Edge! I mean, that white fuckin’ suit and the mustache? It’s the gayest thing I ever saw and he wore it like---” Liam struggled for words.

“Like a god,” Noel said.

“Like a fuckin’ GOD! And the sound, it was just,” Liam held up his hands and shook them around his face, “BWAAAAAAAAAAA.”

It was exactly like that, and Noel was---gutted. All he ever wanted was to be a rock star. All the hours spent alone in his room, the bleeding fingers, the endless nights working out complicated solos, the most complicated he could manage, and now this fuckin’ pansy came along and played two notes over 16 bars and made it sound like airplanes, like glass, like machine guns, like the speech of God. He wanted to lay down his head and weep.

“And him.” Liam’s voice went soft in awe. 

Him. Noel’s knees had turned to water; he had collapsed in adoration against a gigantic amplifier and watched with his whole soul. How did he do it? Noel had watched the crowd cry. He watched them scream in ecstasy, men as well as women, watched their faces turn up as if to the sun, and the beads of sweat stand out on their faces in a mirror to the ones on Bono’s own.

Where did he get it? He poured out heat like the sun, and the whole stadium seemed to throb to his--not the lift of his little finger, not his thought or voice, but to the actual heart in his body. Noel wanted to have that, wanted it with a sick and voracious longing.

“And they’re, I don’t know what. I mean...they’re not cunts, are they? They’re just so--”

“Nice.”

This was true. Noel had spent their own set in fierce, workmanlike concentration, ignoring the nerves that shook him like a teenage girl. Were they there, watching? Did they see? When Oasis got through without stumbling under the pressure he was hopeful and proud. 

And they did hear. When Oasis left the stage U2 came to congratulate them, a convoy of men in the most outrageous clothes, generous, polite, telling them all well done in their peculiar, gentle voices.

“Really, really well done,” Edge told him, supremely unselfconscious in his fucking gay mustache. “I love what you’re doing with the Florentine. You’ve got some tremendous sounds coming out of it.” For a moment Noel felt a thrill of pride, followed by a sudden fear that the man was putting him on.

He realized there was a question in the air.

“I don’t even know what you would call it, how nice they are,” Liam repeated.

"Gracious, Mam would say."

Liam tried the sound of it, a little foreign on his tongue. “Gracious. Yeah, that’s right. Real fuckin’ gents. Why they do that, you think? Not very rock’n’roll, innit?”

“It must do summat for them,” Noel observed. “Look at where they are.”

“Lookin’ behind ‘em in fear!” Liam crowed. “Cause they know we’re after ‘em.”

“I dunno,” said Noel thoughtfully. “There’s summat there....” He saw it in the way they spoke to each other, with that unbelievable delicacy which amounted to tenderness. He saw it from a distance in the way they stood, heads together, with a gentle murmur that reminded him of bees.

“I can’t wait until it’s us,” Liam cried. “We’re on our way, cunts, give me the American stadiums!”

Noel didn’t have the heart to tell him that U2 had broken America when they were just 23 years old. Liam was older than that now--they all were. It took relentless concentration and stamina for a British band to break America. The place was just so fucking huge, the audience so demanding, the tours unending, and Noel was terribly, terribly afraid that they had already missed their chance, years ago.

He could see what it took to keep U2 on the road even if Liam couldn’t: the battalion of terrifyingly competent women who ran their operation; the roadies who had been on every tour since 1982 and would personally slaughter anyone who put a spanner in the works; the faultless planning and execution; Paul McGuinness’s relentless focus on the dollars. It looked like a circus but it ran like an automobile factory. The band could trust it utterly. But most importantly---

He had watched Bono whisper something in Edge’s ear, there in the backstage after the show. Edge’s austere profile unfolded into a little grin, making him look absurdly young and pleased. Bono leaned back in to say something more, it seemed, but Noel could see that there were no words. He just gave Edge a little snuzzle on the cheek. Edge whispered something back in affirmation, and they walked out together. Noel could see that they weren’t really holding hands but he could have sworn that somehow they were, heads inclined toward each other like teenagers in love.

He realized there was another question hanging in the air and encountered Liam’s radiant face, limned with the faintest trace of anxiety. 

“Soon,” he told him, and that was the right answer, because Liam’s face relaxed in happy reassurance. He plastered Noel’s face with beery kisses and buried his face in his jacket. Noel smoothed his hair and, awkwardly at first, wrapped his arms around the bony shoulders and watched the flickering lights go by. Soon enough.

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by this piece by Neil McCormick, who saw it.
> 
> https://www.u2.com/news/title/when-oasis-hit-the-road-with-u2/news/


End file.
